Canada’s privacy watchdog says it has opened an investigation into the Equifax breach after dozens of calls from concerned Canadians. This comes as the Canadian Automobile Association or CAA, reports that at least 10 000 customers may be at risk.
While credit monitoring agency Equifax says that this summer’s hack affected over 140 million American customers, it says that Canadians shouldn’t be worried. Equifax says that only Canadians who lived, worked or applied for a credit card in the U.S. should check their accounts. However, Canadian banks use credit agencies like Equifax whenever you apply for a loan or credit card, so until the company says so, there’s a chance your information was leaked.
While it isn’t a loan, back in March of 2015, CAA and Equifax partnered to offer customers an identity theft prevention service. Out of CAA’s 6.2 million customers, about 10 000 signed up. The service ended June 2017, around the same time the hack reportedly took place. So far Equifax is keeping CAA in the dark.
Multiple attempts to contact a customer service and media relations representative with Equifax were unsuccessful. Meanwhile, the state of Massachusetts announced this week that it’s filing a lawsuit, which will maintain that the company failed to adopt appropriate safeguards to protect the sensitive data. Several other states are in the works to follow it’s lead.